It is known from “Software für die Automatisierung—Transparenz über The Abläufe schaffen (software for automation—creating transparency across execution sequences”, an article by Dirk Kozian in Elektronik für die Automatisierung 11, 1T._C1.1999 that what are known as Manufacturing Execution Systems (MES) can be used for automation of production or manufacturing execution sequences. These systems integrate the automation level (controls) with the ERP (ERP: Enterprise Resource Planning) systems of the enterprise control level. Manufacturing Execution Systems are systems which for example provide information for optimization of production execution sequences. On the one hand the Manufacturing Execution Systems must supplement the outline planning data of the ERP systems with system-specific and current detailed planning data and forward this accordingly to the subordinate automation level, on the other hand they have the task of transferring production-relevant information from the automation level, editing the data and passing it on to the enterprise control level. MES systems thus fulfill the task of a vertical integration between the enterprise control level and the automation level. Typical individual tasks of MES systems are Enterprise Asset Management, Maintenance Management, Information Management, Scheduling, Dispatching and Trace & Track. These tasks are executed by MES components or MES applications.
The use of asynchronously cooperating state machines for modeling communication systems is known from “Communicating and Mobile Systems: the n-Calculus”, Robin Milner, Cambridge University Press, 1999.
An editor for creating process plans is known from EP 1 134 636. Here process plans are formed with the aid of rules by linking process targets. Process plans formed are checked and depending on the checking a release message can be activated.